No. 5 Washington sweeps cross-state rival No. 12 Washington State

SEATTLE -- Cross-state and conference rival, No. 12 Washington State made their way to Seattle to race Saturday morning against fifth-ranked Washington on the Montlake Cut. The Dawgs would sweep all five races against the Cougars. After a beautiful morning on the Cut, head coach Bob Ernst was pleased with the results.

“I thought the performance today was really good,” Ernst said. “I’m pleased that we had a good crowd, and like I’ve been telling the kids all week, there were more Cougars today then they would think were on the face of the earth. It was great. We have a good tradition racing against them and they have a lot of really good athletes.”

UW could just taste the sweep last year on the Cougar’s home course on the Snake River, only dropping races in the 4+s category, and in 2012 the only contest to not finish in the Huskies’ favor was the N8+. Saturday it was clear that they were not going to let the clean victory slip through their hands again.

The varsity 8+ would kickoff all the action for the day, and the set the tone for the whole regatta early on. They would cross the finish line with a solid open water gap in 6:17.52 ahead of WSU, who would finish in 6:22.60.

Next up were the V4+s. Two UW boats would battle two WSU crews, and it was obvious that they did not want to see a repeat of last year’s results. The two Husky boats would make it a close race between themselves and finish first and second with times of 7:12.51 and 7:15.75.

In the novice 8+s, there was again a four team field split down the middle between the two schools and the UW crews would avoid the fate of the 2012 team, finishing first (6:52.92) and second (7:05.96), again.

The second to last women’s race of the day, the second varsity 8+s, was an exciting one. Right from the start, both teams were fired up and pushing hard to get the edge over the boat next to them. But, during the last 500m the UW’s sprint would prove too much for WSU.

In what would end up being the closest race of the day, the UW 2V8+ would grind out a photo finish first place in 6:37.80 over the Cougars’ 6:38.46.

To round out the women’s slate, the open 8+s would take on the course. The Washington 4V8+ and 5V8+ faced a WSU boat and would end up battling each other over the second half of the course. The 5V8+ ended up crossing the finish line just ahead of the 4V8+ with times of 7:06.95 and 7:09.75 respectively.

“Our team performed really well today. I don’t even know the last time that we won every race against them, so I’m really proud of that. I’m glad we swept all the races today, and now we’ve got two weeks to get ready for Cal,” Ernst furthered.